"King Duncan King Duncan is a fictional character in Shakespeare's ""Macbeth."" He is the father of two youthful sons (Malcolm and Donalbain), and the victim of a well-plotted regicide in a power grab by his trusted captain Macbeth. The origin of the character lies in a narrative of the historical Donnchad mac Crinain, King of Scots, in Raphael Holinshed's 1587 ""The Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland,"" a history of Britain familiar to Shakespeare and his contemporaries. Unlike Holinshed's incompetent King Duncan (who is credited in the narrative with a ""feeble and slothful administration""), Shakespeare's King Duncan is crafted as"
"murder Duncan in order to obtain kingship. When Macbeth arrives at Inverness, she overrides all of her husband's objections by challenging his manhood and successfully persuades him to kill the king that very night. He and Lady Macbeth plan to get Duncan's two chamberlains drunk so that they will black out; the next morning they will blame the chamberlains for the murder. They will be defenceless as they will remember nothing. While Duncan is asleep, Macbeth stabs him, despite his doubts and a number of supernatural portents, including a hallucination of a bloody dagger. He is so shaken that Lady"
"Macbeth has to take charge. In accordance with her plan, she frames Duncan's sleeping servants for the murder by placing bloody daggers on them. Early the next morning, Lennox, a Scottish nobleman, and Macduff, the loyal Thane of Fife, arrive. A porter opens the gate and Macbeth leads them to the king's chamber, where Macduff discovers Duncan's body. Macbeth murders the guards to prevent them from professing their innocence, but claims he did so in a fit of anger over their misdeeds. Duncan's sons Malcolm and Donalbain flee to England and Ireland, respectively, fearing that whoever killed Duncan desires their"
"2, scene 3 to the drunken porter to report to his duty of awaking King Duncan when he is sleeping for the night at Macbeth's castle. When he discovers the corpse of King Duncan (murdered by Macbeth, but it appears that nearby guards are guilty since Macbeth—at the prodding of Lady Macbeth—put his knife by them and smeared them with Duncan's blood), he raises an alarm, informing the castle that the king has been murdered. Macduff begins to suspect Macbeth of regicide when Macbeth says, ""O, yet I do repent me of my fury / That I did kill them"""
"He acknowledges that only the innocent sleep and that sleep is ""the balm of hurt minds"". The king's sons, Malcolm and Donalbain, fear they will be blamed for Duncan's death and flee the country. Macbeth is then crowned king. Macbeth becomes a tyrant, brutally stamping out any real or perceived threats to his power. He believes himself to be beyond redemption, ""in blood stepp'd in so far, that, ... returning were as tedious as go o'er"". Macbeth decides to hire two murderers to kill Banquo and his son Fleance, with a Third Murderer sent later to assist. Banquo is murdered,"
"In his ""Roscius Anglicanus"" (1708), Downes claims that the role of Henry VIII in this play was originally performed by John Lowin, who ""had his instructions from Mr. Shakespeare himself."" Fifteen years to the day after the fire, on 29 June 1628, The King's Men performed the play again at the Globe. The performance was witnessed by George Villiers, the contemporary Duke of Buckingham (no relation or descendant to the Duke of Buckingham portrayed in the play) who left halfway through once the play's Duke of Buckingham was executed. (A month later, Villiers was assassinated.) During the Restoration era, Sir"
"Duncan in ""Holinshed's Chronicles"" (1587), a history of England, Scotland, and Ireland familiar to Shakespeare and his contemporaries, although the events in the play differ extensively from the history of the real Macbeth. The events of the tragedy are usually associated with the execution of Henry Garnet for complicity in the Gunpowder Plot of 1605. In the backstage world of theatre, some believe that the play is cursed, and will not mention its title aloud, referring to it instead as ""The Scottish Play"". Over the course of many centuries, the play has attracted some of the most renowned actors to"
"king, why chance may crown me without my stir”. Macbeth becomes fixated on the prophecy, ignoring Banquo's advice that “oftentimes to win us to our harm these instruments of darkness tell us truths…to betray us in deepest consequence”. When he returns home, Lady Macbeth tries to convince him to kill Duncan. Macbeth at first refuses but changes his mind when she accuses him of cowardice. Giving in to his ambition, he kills Duncan and plants evidence of the regicide on two guards, whom he also kills. He hears voices that say ""Macbeth shall sleep no more. Macbeth does murder sleep""."
"hands and she tells him that the water has washed their deed away. In the morning, Macduff finds Duncan dead, and Macbeth slaughters the sleeping servants to prevent their denial of the murder. Macduff and Lennox, a Scottish noble, discuss that as Malcolm has fled to England that puts him under suspicion of being involved in the murder. They also admire Macbeth's justice on the supposedly-treacherous servants. With Malcolm gone, Macbeth is asked to become King of Scotland. After the coronation he sits in a sour mood in his chamber where Lady Macbeth comes to him. He complains that killing"
"Lady Macbeth Lady Macbeth is a leading character in William Shakespeare's tragedy ""Macbeth"" (c.1603–1607). The wife of the play's tragic hero, Macbeth (a Scottish nobleman), Lady Macbeth goads her husband into committing regicide, after which she becomes queen of Scotland. Later, however, she suffers pangs of guilt for her part in the crime, which drives her to sleepwalk. She dies off-stage in the last act, an apparent suicide. According to some genealogists, Lady Macbeth and King Duncan's wife were siblings or cousins, where Duncan's wife had a stronger claim to the throne than Lady Macbeth. It was this that incited"
"as he leaves the bedroom, he sees a reflection of Duncan preparing to shoot him in the back and turns, throwing a dagger, killing Duncan. Lady wipes blood on Duncan's bodyguards to implicate them and Macbeth later shoots them as they appear to be reaching for weapons after they are confronted by Duff and Macbeth. The Deputy Chief Commissioner, Malcolm, is temporarily promoted to replace Duncan but Macbeth admits to Banquo that he murdered Duncan and convinces him to dispose of Malcolm. Malcolm signs a false confession in the guise of a suicide note and, following the discovery of the"
"adding to the darkness of Macbeth's crime as the worst violation of hospitality. Versions of the story that were common at the time had Duncan being killed in an ambush at Inverness, not in a castle. Shakespeare conflated the story of Donwald and King Duff in what was a significant change to the story. Shakespeare made another important change. In ""Chronicles"", Banquo is an accomplice in Macbeth's murder of King Duncan, and plays an important part in ensuring that Macbeth, not Malcolm, takes the throne in the coup that follows. In Shakespeare's day, Banquo was thought to be an ancestor"
"the explosion that killed Rachel. Sensing an Immortal, he turns to see Kate (Lisa Barbuscia), his wife from 200 years before. Then Kell's posse arrives, and fights Duncan (disregarding the rule of one-on-one combat). The fighting stops when Kell arrives, but Carlos shoots Duncan, who falls on a spike, killing him. Kell is furious with Carlos, and beheads him: as the quickening begins, a van drives up to where Duncan fell, and takes him away. Later on, Duncan wakes up, only to realize that he has been taken by Watchers who want to keep him in the Sanctuary so that"
"Once Macbeth is King and they are married, however, she abandons him, revealing that she was not Lady Duncan all along, but a witch. The real Lady Duncan appears and denounces Macbeth as a traitor. The Spanish poet and playwright León Felipe wrote a version of Shakespeare's play in Spanish which significantly changes the witches' role, especially in the final scene. After Macbeth's death, the Three Witches reappear in the midst of wind and storm, which they have been associated with throughout the play, to claim his corpse. They carry it to a ravine and shout, ""Macbeth! Macbeth! Macbeth! /"
"Donalbain (Macbeth) Donalbain is a character in William Shakespeare's ""Macbeth"" (c. 1603–1607). He is the younger son of King Duncan and brother to Malcolm, the heir to the throne. Donalbain flees to Ireland after the murder of his father for refuge. He is based upon a personage in an account of King Duncan in ""Holinshed's Chronicles"", a history of Britain familiar to Shakespeare. He is ultimately based on the historical King Donald III of Scotland. In the original text of the First Folio his name is spelled Donalbaine, and is sometimes also spelled Donaldbain. Shakespeare's Donalbain is based upon 'Donald"
"plays. A lengthy passage, adapted from an 1814 drama review by Hazlitt, compares Macbeth and King Richard III from Shakespeare's play of that name. Both characters ""are tyrants, usurpers, murderers, both aspiring and ambitious, both courageous, cruel, treacherous."" But Richard is ""naturally incapable of good"" and ""wades through a series of crimes [...] from the ungovernable violence of his temper and a reckless love of mischief"", while Macbeth, ""full of 'the milk of human kindness, ""is with difficulty prevailed upon to commit [...] the murder of Duncan"" and is filled ""with remorse after its perpetration."" Similarly, though Lady Macbeth is"
"sees the ghost of one of the dead boy soldiers who gives him a dagger and leads him towards Duncan's tent. Macbeth brutally slays Duncan. Malcolm enters the tent and, seeing what Macbeth has done, flees in fear. Shaken, Macbeth goes to his wife and gives her the dagger he has used to kill the King. Lady Macbeth rebukes him, saying that he should have left it in the tent and she goes herself to place the dagger in the hands of the sleeping chamberlains. Later she meets Macbeth in the church where they both wash the blood from their"
"defeat Death. Instead they find gold, and, overcome with greed, eventually kill each other to possess it. Rowling has cited William Shakespeare's ""Macbeth"" as an influence. In an interview with The Leaky Cauldron and MuggleNet, when asked, ""What if [Voldemort] never heard the prophecy?"", she said, ""It's the ""Macbeth"" idea. I absolutely adore ""Macbeth"". It is possibly my favourite Shakespeare play. And that's the question isn't it? If Macbeth hadn't met the witches, would he have killed Duncan? Would any of it have happened? Is it fated or did he make it happen? I believe he made it happen."" On"
"the throne. Edmund and his younger brothers Edgar, Alexander and David fled abroad, to England, to join their half-brother Duncan at the court of William Rufus. In 1094 Duncan, with Rufus's blessing and the support of landless nobles from the English court and landowners in Lothian, drove Donald from the throne. It is supposed that Edmund, as the next in age, was Duncan's heir-designate. Duncan was forced by a rebellion to send his English allies home, and was shortly afterwards killed. The killer was Máel Petair, Mormaer of Mearns, but the Annals of Ulster and William of Malmesbury agree that"
"Duncan was for nothing as Macbeth has no heirs to inherit the crown which will pass to Banquo and his son, Fleance, according to the prophecy. He invites Banquo with his son to a banquet and finds out that they both plan to leave. As Banquo is becoming suspicious, Macbeth sends three assassins to murder him. Banquo is killed, but Fleance escapes to the woods. During the evening, Macbeth makes a comment about Banquo not keeping his promise to be at the feast. When the assassins arrive, Macbeth asks if they have succeeded and is enraged when he finds out"
"orders him to return them to the scene of the crime. He refuses. She carries the daggers to the room and smears the drugged attendants with blood. The couple retire to wash their hands. Following the murder of King Duncan, Lady Macbeth's role in the plot diminishes. When Duncan's sons flee the land in fear for their own lives, Macbeth is appointed king. Without consulting his queen, Macbeth plots other murders in order to secure his throne, and, at a royal banquet, the queen is forced to dismiss her guests when Macbeth hallucinates. In her last appearance, she sleepwalks in"
"uncle, Claudius, who murdered Hamlet's father to obtain the throne), discovered en route a letter from the King carried by his old but now untrusted friends Rosencrantz and Guildenstern. The letter commanded Hamlet's death upon his arrival in England. Hamlet rewrote the letter to command Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's deaths and escaped back to Denmark. By the end of Shakespeare's play, Prince Hamlet, Laertes, Ophelia, Polonius, King Claudius and Queen Gertrude all lie dead. An ambassador from England arrives to bluntly report ""Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead"" (""Hamlet"". Act V, Scene II, line 411) and so they join all the stabbed,"
"Macbeth embraces it. Sometimes, however, his motives are unclear, and some critics question his purity. He does nothing to accuse Macbeth of murdering the king, even though he has reason to believe Macbeth is responsible. Shakespeare often used Raphael Holinshed's ""Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland""—commonly known as ""Holinshed's Chronicles""—as a source for his plays, and in ""Macbeth"" he borrows from several of the tales in that work. Holinshed portrays Banquo as a historical figure: he is an accomplice in Mac Bethad mac Findlaích's (Macbeth's) murder of Donnchad mac Crínáin (King Duncan) and plays an important part in ensuring that"
"Henry IV, he has Richard taken prisoner to the castle of Pomfret. Aumerle and others plan a rebellion against the new king, but York discovers his son's treachery and reveals it to Henry, who spares Aumerle as a result of the intercession of the Duchess of York while executing the other conspirators. After interpreting King Henry's ""living fear"" as a reference to the still-living Richard, an ambitious nobleman (Exton) goes to the prison and murders him. King Henry repudiates the murderer and vows to journey to Jerusalem to cleanse himself of his part in Richard's death. Shakespeare's primary source for"
"the encounter with the witches. She is determined to propel Macbeth to the throne - by fair means or foul. Lady Macbeth is advised that King Duncan will stay in the castle that night; she is determined to see him killed (""Or tutti, sorgete"" / ""Arise now, all you ministers of hell""). When Macbeth returns she urges him to take the opportunity to kill the King. The King and the nobles arrive and Macbeth is emboldened to carry out the murder (""Mi si affaccia un pugnal?"" / ""Is this a dagger which I see before me?""), but afterwards is filled"
"with horror. Disgusted at his cowardice, Lady Macbeth completes the crime, incriminating the sleeping guards by smearing them with Duncan's blood and planting on them Macbeth's dagger. Macduff arrives for an appointment with the King, while Banco stands guard, only for Macduff instead to discover the murder. He rouses the castle while Banco also bears witness to the fact of Duncan's murder. The chorus calls on God to avenge the killing (""Schiudi, inferno, . ."" / ""Open wide thy gaping maw, O Hell""). ""Scene 1: A room in the castle"" Macbeth is now king: Duncan's son Malcolm has fled the"
"murder of Duff has its motivation in revenge rather than ambition. In Holinshed's account of King Duncan, the discussion of Lady Macbeth is confined to a single sentence: Not found in Holinshed are the invocation to the ""spirits that tend on mortal thoughts,"" the sleepwalking scene, and various details found in the drama concerning the death of Macbeth. Lady Macbeth makes her first appearance late in scene five of the first act, when she learns in a letter from her husband that three witches have prophesied his future as king. When King Duncan becomes her overnight guest, Lady Macbeth seizes"
"Polanski's film of Macbeth, in which Donalbain, returning to Scotland after the death of Macbeth, hears the witches murmuring in the heather and gets off his horse to investigate, evidently alludes to the historical fact that Donalbain seized the throne after the death of Malcolm. Donalbain (Macbeth) Donalbain is a character in William Shakespeare's ""Macbeth"" (c. 1603–1607). He is the younger son of King Duncan and brother to Malcolm, the heir to the throne. Donalbain flees to Ireland after the murder of his father for refuge. He is based upon a personage in an account of King Duncan in ""Holinshed's"
"receives a prophecy from a trio of witches that one day he will become King of Scotland. Consumed by ambition and spurred to action by his wife, Macbeth murders King Duncan and takes the Scottish throne for himself. He is then wracked with guilt and paranoia. Forced to commit more and more murders to protect himself from enmity and suspicion, he soon becomes a tyrannical ruler. The bloodbath and consequent civil war swiftly take Macbeth and Lady Macbeth into the realms of madness and death. Shakespeare's source for the story is the account of Macbeth, King of Scotland; Macduff; and"
"Duncan's generous and trusting nature contrasts strikingly with the evil which surrounds Macbeth. Though he appears only in Act 1, he is an important symbol of the values that are to be defeated and restored in the course of the play. His generosity and fatherly affection for Macbeth make his murder even more appalling. The unconscious irony is sharp when he greets Macbeth, who is already plotting against him, with a declaration of his own ingratitude, in 1.4.14–16. Duncan's faith, misplaced first in the rebellious Cawdor and then in Macbeth, provides the audience with an introduction to the atmosphere of"
"female figures: Cleopatra and Lady Macbeth. Shakespeare borrowed the story from several tales in ""Holinshed's Chronicles"", a popular history of the British Isles well known to Shakespeare and his contemporaries. In ""Chronicles"", a man named Donwald finds several of his family put to death by his king, King Duff, for dealing with witches. After being pressured by his wife, he and four of his servants kill the King in his own house. In ""Chronicles"", Macbeth is portrayed as struggling to support the kingdom in the face of King Duncan's ineptitude. He and Banquo meet the three witches, who make exactly"
"trip Macbeth meets the three witches, who prophesy that he will soon be in Duncan's position with control over the gang. He tells his wife this, though she doubts he has it in him to take over Duncan's position. Later when she learns that Duncan will be dining and staying at their house, she plots with her husband to kill him. Lady Macbeth drugs Duncan's bodyguards, and while they sleep Macbeth takes their knives and kills Duncan, framing the guards. Macduff comes to Inverness and finds Duncan murdered in his bed. Before the bodyguards can profess their innocence Macbeth shoots"
"in which the murder of King Duncan by Macbeth and Lady Macbeth is succeeded by Macduff and Lennox knocking at the gate of the castle. The knocking ends Act II, scene 2 and opens II, 3, the Porter scene. De Quincey wrote that for him, the knocking always had a pronounced effect: ""it reflected back upon the murderer a peculiar awfulness and a depth of solemnity..."" De Quincey could not account rationally for this response, according to the then-accepted canons of literary criticism; and he proceeded, through his essay, to venture a more psychological interpretation than had previously been applied"